Many different kinds of food loaves are produced; they come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes. There are meat loaves made from various different meats, including ham, pork, beef, lamb, turkey, and fish. These meat loaves come in different shapes (round, square, rectangular, oval, etc.) and in different lengths. The cross-sectional sizes of the loaves are also variable. Loaves of cheese or other foods also vary in shape, length, and transverse size.
Typically, the food loaves are sliced, the slices are grouped in accordance with a particular weight requirement, and groups of slices are packaged and sold at retail. For some products, neatly aligned stacked slice groups are preferred. For others, the groups are shingled so that a purchaser can see a part of every slice through a transparent package.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,428,263 describes a high speed food loaf-slicing machine. Some other known high speed food slicing machines have provided for slicing two food loaves simultaneously with a single, cyclically driven knife blade, such as described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,628,237; 5,649,463; 5,704,265; 5,974,925; and European published application EP 0 713 753 A2.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,628,237 and European published application EP 0 713 753 A2 describe a back-clamp type slicing machine. According to this type of slicing machine, two loaves are loaded onto a lift tray and the lift tray is raised to a ready-to-sweep position. Two loaf grippers are retracted after the previous loaves are sliced. During retraction of the loaf grippers, loaf-to-slicing blade gate doors are closed and butt ends of the previous loaves are dropped through a butt door. After the grippers have reached the retracted position or “home position” remote from the slicing blade, a loaf sweep mechanism is activated, moving the loaves about 20.6 inches laterally into the slicing position. The grippers then advance after it has been determined that the loaf sweep mechanism has moved the loaves to the slicing position. After sensing and gripping the loaves, the loaves are retracted slightly, and the loaf-to-slicing blade gate doors are opened and the loaves are advanced to the slicing plane of the slicing blade. The loaf sweep mechanism retracts and the loaf lift tray lowers, ready for the next reload cycle. According to this design, in practice, the reload cycle is accomplished in about six seconds. In a high volume slicing operation, reload cycle time can be a significant limitation to optimum production efficiency.
The present inventors have recognized that it would be advantageous to provide a more time-effective method of reloading slicing machines.